The Key Skill Every Leader Needs in the AI Era

It's so hard for me to accept praise, and I'm starving for it. At the same time, it's so hard for me to accept it even though I'm starving for it. I dismiss it. And that's what drives us as entrepreneurs, is that drive to, you know, be better. So the podcast is called the Second in Command. I decided to interview a group of people that no one was interviewing, right? The people that didn't have the voice. We've all heard the entrepreneur story, but I want the rest of the story. You know, from Australia. As an example, we have Naomi Simpson from Red Balloon Day. I've known Naomi for 20 years. Well, I would like to know her COO's side of the story. I've heard Naomi side of the story about how we built it, but I want to know of her second in command side of how did we build Red Balloon Days and how's it different? It's different because they see it from an operational perspective. It's all here. Here's a perfect example. Your mom and dad raised you, and if I said, hey, Mrs. Vaz, how did you raise Ronsley? She would tell me a very true story of how she raised you. And if I said to your dad, hey, how did you raise Ronsley? He would tell me, and he'd have a very true story. They'd be different somehow, even though they're in the same darn house, they would have a different story with similarities. It's that viewpoint. So the entrepreneurs tend to fly at the 30,000 foot. They stay with culture, they stay with core values. They stay with vision. They stay with drive, they stay with urgency. The COO tends to be the brakes to the entrepreneur's gas. We tend to be the leash to the entrepreneur's dragon. We tend to be the who, what, when, where, why, and how to the where. Like we're going, right? We have to figure out how to take all of those crazy ideas and make them happen.

Someone looks at the way the world's going, especially now, what are the skills that we need to be developing? Whether we are the CEO or the CEO or even an employee in the business, what kind of skills should we be looking at developing? Because things are changing quite drastically, right? But I think about when I was growing up, it was Dr. Ingenier, lawyer, accountant, and you're set for life. Now that comes for less than $20 a month.

So the biggest skill, and this is going to surprise you, that I think every leader has to get really good at, is empathy and the emotional intelligence to Connect with humans. Because the reality is every single person is struggling with something today. You're struggling with something today, whether it's a relationship, parents, moving, health, financial worry, whatever the things are. At the end of the day, we are humans trapped in these adult bodies, struggling with this human condition. And we all know we're going to die. If a leader can attach to humans as humans and connect with them at that human level and really connect with them and care about them, those employees will go through brick walls for you to build a company. But every employee out there is worried about AI. They're worried about meeting payroll. They're worried about their mom who's sick. They're worried about their dog that just threw up. They're worried about the relationship with the spouse that isn't going that well and no one cares about them enough. And I think it's a skill that we have to get better at. Especially now post Covid where so many companies are going remote. You now have these individuals working at home from a bedroom for eight hours a day without any human connection of anybody that actually gives.

It doesn't surprise me because I would say the same thing if someone asked me about skills right now, because I was just asked before and I genuinely believe it's the human skills that's going to be the biggest difference. How do we start to inculcate that as leaders? Like when we are responsible for all our people and then we've been trained in a certain way, like our time is money and all that kind of old paradigms, how do we start to execute them inside the business?

So a couple of things have happened that have given us the insights that it's changing is social media. When it started 15 years ago with Facebook, around 2007, when the Facebook launched, leaders all of a sudden couldn't have a game face anymore. We couldn't have a professional side anymore because everybody saw the real us. I just had a business breakfast this morning with a CEO from Dubai, runs multiple companies. I hopped on his Facebook. I'm like, oh, now I know who you are. Right. Well, every leader, everyone around us now knows who we are. So we just have to show up as us. I think that's one change that's happening.

I feel like we, to your point, we take it for granted. We just assume that they know and that they probably don't.

Well, and a lot of entrepreneurs also struggle with prai is because often entrepreneurs, I don't know what this is, but many, many entrepreneurs are doing this because we need someone to say good job because we didn't get it as a kid. And it's partially from the school system. A lot of entrepreneurs didn't do well in school, right? So they always felt like they were stupid in school. They were very middle of the school. They weren't the A students. So they're starving for someone to say, gold star, gold star. And because of that, because we never got it, it's hard for us to give it. But if we recognize that everybody is a child trapped in an adult body, you're still the 16 year old wrongsley trapped in this adult body. I'm the 16 year old Cameron trapped in this adult body. So I have my same 16 year old needs, which is praise and acceptance and gratitude and love and a friend. So if you recognize that as a leader and you give those things, it's like Maslow's hierarchy of needs. You win. Business is really simple.

It's so true, though. Like, we in general, like, I know lots of other entrepreneurs who don't. No, I would take praise. I don't. I'm still learning how to take praise. And sometimes it's so bad that when someone's introducing me before I go up on stage, I'm hearing all these things. Even when it's a podcast, I'm dismissing them. No, I listen. I'm like, wow, that's so cool. And they say my name like, oh, it's just me.

I literally have this thinking, feeling that he's talking about me. It's so hard for me to accept praise and I'm starving for it at the same time. It's so hard for me to accept it even though I'm starving for it. I dismiss it. And that's what drives us as entrepreneurs, is that drive to, you know, be better. What are some ways that we can look at conflict or deal with conflict.

In a better way? Especially because we're trying now to be better humans, more empathetic. How can we do that better?

I have 12 models in my invest in your leaders course, and one of them is conflict management. I'll walk you through a model, kind of an entrepreneur or Cliff Notes version. The first is to confront the issue then, not the person. When you showed up late for this meeting. Right. Or when you didn't deliver your project on time, or when you spoke to the customer that way. Right? The issue, not. You always do so the specific issue. Confront the issue. So I use when you. And then I feel. I felt frustrated. I was angry. I was really disappointed. I was mad at you. So you own it. And then you tell the person what you need, right? I need you to do this way in the future. And then you say, how do you feel about it? Not what do you think about it, how do you feel about it? So when you. I feel. I need. How do you feel? So the specific situation versus a general, and you have to race to the conflict. So if you showed up late for a meeting this morning, I will address it today. I'll pull you up. Aside privately, public praise, private criticism.

I want to land this plane because we've been talking for a while and we can keep talking. When you look at your history as a creator, as a leader, what are things that stand out? That's not in the bio.

What's.

Things that Cameron cares about.

I've only been listening, but I love his. How cognitive, cognizant he is about the dangers of AI and the opportunities with AI and how he's able to balance all of that. I think he's very cognizant of, you know, artificial general intelligence and where we're going with this and the threat to potentials of humanity, but also the opportunities and. And I'm also just super impressed with how he's been able to lead an organization that's in massive hypergrowth and very decentralized, and it's pretty freaking fast.

Cameron, this is a little slice of heaven.

Thank you. Thank you. It was great, Ronsley.

Thank you so much.

You need to understand the difference between a coo, a VP of Operations, and a Director of Operations. And if you don't understand that, you're making huge, massive mistakes. So check out all the resources below on what the differences are between a coo, VP Operations, and a Director of Operations, and how you can leverage the titles of people that are in those different roles.